My affection for Dustin Pedroia has grown by leaps and bounds over this season. He's a little firecracker, a throwback, a gamer, scrappy enough to earn his nickname of Scrappy-Doo. And the citizens of Red Sox Nation aren't the only fans of Lil' Dusty P - his college coach from Arizona State, Pat Murphy, is a big Dusty fan- and Coach Murphy had a ton of interesting stuff to say about Dustin. This article is a GOLD MINE for funny Dusty P stories. Some highlights?

"[T]his kid every game when we were facing a pretty good pitcher from Wichita State or Duke or something he'd lead off the game and hit a line drive and come running past the pitcher yelling 'you better get used to it... I'm going to be hitting rockets off you all day.' Then he hits a home run against [Mike] Pelfrey and he yells to him '97 mph coming in and 197 mph going out' as he's rounding the bases. He'd just be chirping the whole game."

"He's really willed his way to the big leagues... he really has. Let's break it down: He's 5-foot-6, he's can't run, he's not strong, his bat speed and his hands are tremendous because his arms are only about 11 inches long and so close to his body that he's not getting to anything hit 5 or 6 inches to the right or left of him and he doesn't have a lick of athletic ability... yet he's a rookie of the year candidate."

"Mike Gallego is a good friend of mine and I used to tell [Pedroia] that he reminded me of Gags. That used to piss Pedroia off. He would say 'Mike [expletive] Gallego, are you [expletive] me?' and he would say that all the way back when he was a freshman."

And my favorite of all:

"[T]hen Pedroia walks by, flexes and then says 'Hey Murph check out these guns, man.' The guy has the biceps of a six-year-old, he has no business wearing a shirt with cut-off sleeves and I'm getting blinded by the shine from the head of a college freshman that's going bald; then he just proceeded to go out and make every play."

Huge thanks to 12 eight for the tip on this fabulous article.